Crime Investigation Australia

For the 2008 launch of Crime Investigation Australia CI presents the complete and compelling story of "The Killing Fields of Truro", one of the most infamous crimes in Australia and yet another set in Adelaide. Seven young women disappeared in the 51 days between December 23, 1976 and February 12, 1977. James William Miller confessed that during this time he helped the man he loved, Christopher Robin Worrell, dispose of the bodies of the young women who Worrell had sexually assaulted and then murdered while Miller was waiting nearby. The skeletal remains of four of the victims were discovered in bush graves over a 12 month period in 1978-79 in the Truro district, 80 kilometres north-east of Adelaide.

The horrific story of killers Allan Baker and Kevin Crump who began their murderous spree in rural NSW by killing a complete stranger for $20, a packet of cigarettes and a couple of litres of petrol. They then kidnapping Virginia Morse, a young mother of three, raped and tortured her as they drove to Queensland. Virginia's torture ended there when she was tied to a tree and shot. In the wake of their 1973 trial, the Australian public was left to ponder whether the two men were insane, or, even more chilling, whether their deeds were the result of rational minds gone astray. Shortcomings in Australian Criminal law were exposed because as Virginia Morse was killed in Queensland, New South Wales authorities could not charge the pair with her murder. Not wanting to extradite the two men, New South Wales police chose to charge them with conspiracy to murder Virginia Morse. Fortunately the New South Wales prosecutors didn't have to rely only on the Morse allegations. Their list of crimes also included the murder of Ian Lamb, the stranger, as well as wounding a policeman, as well as car theft.

In 1959 the carefree culture of Perth changed forever when a plague of crime hit the city. By early 1963 the crime wave had escalated to serial murder. A couple were shot at as they sat in their car. In separate incidents two men were shot and killed at point blank range as they slept. Another was shot between the eyes as he opened his front door. A young woman was strangled to death and raped. An 18-year-old babysitter was executed as she studied and listened to music in front of the fire. All this was the work of one man: Eric Edgar Cooke.

In 1981, the headless and fingerless body of 19-year-old Kim Narelle Barry was found dumped in the bush at a mountain lookout near Wollongong, south of Sydney. Kim’s head and fingers were later found in bushland some distance from the lookout and damage to the skull showed she had been bludgeoned to death. Then, by chance, detectives discovered that on the night she died Kim had been in the company of a local miner, 24-year-old Graham Potter, who had suddenly disappeared. A national manhunt led to his eventual surrender. Potter was convicted of Kim Barry’s murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. No motive was ever established for the killing and Potter, who was released in 1996 after serving 15 years, still declares he is innocent.

On July 10 2001 Sef Gonzales murdered his sister Clodine 18; mother Mary Loiva Josephine 43, and his father Teddy 46, in their North Ryde home. He claimed that he had discovered the bodies when he arrived home, and that racist graffiti was sprayed on the wall. However as more evidence was unearthed, police started to see Sef as a very likely suspect. It was revealed that Sef attempted to cover up his academic failure by falsifying results, and when his parents found out they threatened to withdraw certain privileges such as the use of his car. At the same time, he had argued with his mother over a girlfriend she had disapproved of. These along with the desire to inherit the family's fortune were established as strong motives for Gonzales killing his parents and sister.

On a September night in 1986, two police officers climbed through a barbed-wire fence beside the F4 freeway at Minchinbury in Sydney’s west. They were accompanied by two teenage boys who guided them to the edge of a shallow dam where the beams from torches outlined the body of a young woman lying in the mud. She was later identified as nineteen-year-old Sydney bank clerk, Janine Balding. She had been abducted, raped, beaten and drowned. The shock was compounded when police arrested the gang responsible and found their youngest member was just 14 years old. The others present were a boy and girl both aged 15, a 16-year-old boy, and their leader, 21-year old Stephen “Shorty” Jamieson, who despite his physical maturity had the mental age of 10. It appears the gang was seeking to impress each other with their toughness when they set out to rape a woman. They selected Janine at random.

This chilling CIA episode details the long and difficult investigation which began with the disappearance of 18-year-old secretary Sarah Spiers from a night club in the up-market Perth suburb of Claremont on Australia Day, 1996. The new information has been kept secret by police until now for fear its release could jeopardise the investigation. Now, for the first time, it's being shown to the public and viewers will be asked to look closely and to call Crimestoppers if they believe they can help.

A chilling investigation of John Ernest Cribb, who on August 11th 1978, broke into the home of the Connell's. On a winter’s afternoon, Valda Connell and her four-year-old son Damien arrived home after having collected ten-year-old Sally from school. What was as an average day for the family turned to horror when Valda and the children were confronted by a man brandishing a knife and ordering them back into the car. The man, John Ernest Cribb, had just a couple of months earlier been released on parole after serving about six years for armed robbery. As Cribb drove north towards Taree, on the NSW Mid North Coast, Valda pleaded to let her and her children go. Later, under the dark of night, Cribb raped the 39-year-old mother, while her two children remained in the car terrified, cold, and hungry. In the early hours of the next morning near the small town of Wingham, Cribb left the family gagged and bound in bushland next to a deserted road and then drove back south towards Newcastle. But his thoughts got the better of him as he began telling himself that Valda knew too much, and decided he must instead go back and silence her. He returns and with his knife, viciously slays the family, one by one…

Serial killer Leonard Fraser was suspected of killing at least five women over a 17 year period but took the complete truth about his life of crime to his grave. Fraser was convicted of the murders of three people, including a 9 year old girl and the manslaughter of another woman.

The bloodied, semi-naked body of 30-year-old Donna Wheeler is discovered by her estranged husband Keith Bond and 12-year-old son. Donna had been brutally beaten and stabbed and when police investigate they discover that Donna’s estranged husband is a suspect but evidence also points to Keith’s brother Colin. Which brother really killed Donna Wheeler?